Adjustable garment hanger



March 30, 1954 w, P. RIDDELL 2,673,668

ADJUSTABLE GARMENT HANGER Filed Aug. O, 1950 Patented Mar. 30, 1954 UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE ADJUSTABLE GARMENT HANGER William P. Riddell, London, Ontario, Canada Application August 30, 1950, Serial No. 182,197

1 Claim. l

This invention relates generally to a coat hanger, and relates more particularly to a coat hanger having arms that can be extended endwisethereof to accommodate the shoulders of coats having varied Widths.

Adjustable coat hangers of the particular type with which this invention is concerned have been provided in the past. The general construction of the means for securing adjustment has been more or less complex either in manufacture or in use or both, so that the proposals of the past have not been generally accepted. I have devised an adjustable coat hanger having a simple, practical construction which I feel is a substantial improvement over the teachings of the prior art.

My coat hanger has a body portion with two arms slidably mounted therein for extension end- Wise thereof to accommodate coats or other garments having shoulders of various widths. According to the invention I provide a locking means for locking engagement with each of the slidably mounted arms, and spring means mounted on the hanger body loaded to urge the locking means into operative engagement with the arms whereby to maintain them in any given position of adjustment. The invention will be clearly understood after reference to the following detailed specification read in conjunction with the drawings.

In the drawings:

Figure 1 is a view showing a coat hanger of the present invention with the extendable arms in a completely retracted position.

Figure 2 is a view of the same coat hanger showing the arms in an extended position.

Figure 3 is a perspective view showing one of the arms.

Figure 4 is a sectional view along the line 4-4 of Figure 1.

Referring to the drawings, the coat hanger there shown has a body portion generally indicated by the numeral I that is formed, in thev usual way, with two diverging downwardly sloping edges II and I2 over which the shoulders of a coat or other garment can be hung. The body portion III in addition has slideways I3 and I 4 each to slidably receive therein one of the arms I6 and I'I. In the embodiment of the invention shown the two slideways I3 and I4 communicate with each other. It will be understood of course, that they need not do so.

In use, the free ends of the arms I6 and II are extended from the ends of the body to engage and support the inner tip of the shoulders of the garment.

and I2 to support the garment.

As indicated above, a coat hanger that is generally capable of adjustment in this way is not new. My invention is the provision of a simple and practical means for controlling the locking means that retains the slidable arms I6 and Il in a predetermined position of adjustment. According to my invention, each arm I6 and I'I has a locking means, and a spring means carried by the body of the hanger loaded to urge the locking means into operative locking engagement with the arms.

In the embodiment of the invention shown, the locking means comprises a pin I8 which enters through a hole I9 in the body IIJ to bind against the arm I6. A spring 20 rigidly secured to the hanger body as at 2l is loaded to urge the pin I8 into operative engagement with the arm I6. The hole I9 must of course be wide enough to permit some longitudinal movement of the pin I8 therein without binding.

The arm I 6 is also formed with a series of 1ongitudinally spaced apart recesses IBa for coaction with the pin I8 as illustrated in Figure 4. It should be noted that the pin I8 extends at substantially right angles to the free end of the loaded leaf spring so that its longitudinal axis is inclined to the longitudinal axis of the arm I6. The inclination is such that the rounded free end of the pin will ride out of the recesses I8a as the arm I 6 is slid from the body of the hanger but will bind in the recesses I 8a to resist any forces that tend to insert the arm in the body of the hanger. In order to slide the arm from an extended position into its slideway it is necessary to manually Withdraw the pin clear of the recesses Ita. Other arrangements of pin I8 and arm I6 that will cause the arm to bind against forces tending to slide it into the body of the hanger but will permit it to be withdrawn from the body of the hanger will be apparent to those skilled in the art after consideration of my method.

For convenience, I have described in detail only the locking of the arm I6, but it will be understood that the locking of arm I1 is identical with the locking of arm I6.

A wire 22 for the purpose of hanging a pair of trousers or the like can be simply incorporated into a hanger according to my invention.

The embodiments of my invention other than the ones shown will be apparent to those skilled in the art and I do not intend that my patent should be limited to the specic embodiment there shown.

What I claim as my invention is:

In a garment hanger having a body with two diverging downwardly sloping edges over which the shoulders of a coat can be hung, two arms, said body being formed with two slideways each to slidably receive one of said arms and to dispose one of said arms with its free end extending from one end of said body and the other of said arms with its free end extending from the other end of said body, whereby said arms co-act with said shoulder supporting edges to support the shoulders of a garment, two leaf springs each secured at one end to said body, one of said springs hav ing its longitudinal axis aligned with the longitudinal axis of one of said slideways, the other of said springs having its longitudinal axis aligned with the longitudinal axis of the other of said slideways, a locking pin carried by each of said springs adjacent its free end, said body being formed with holes communicating with said slideways whereby each of said pins carried by said leaf springs enters into one of said slideways, said arms being formed with longitudinal spaced apart notches to receive said pins, said springs being loaded to normally force said locking pins into their respective slideways, and into engagement with said notches in said arms, said pins extending from said leaf springs to enter said notches at an incline to permit said arms to be freely drawn in an outward direction from said body but to positively lock them from being slid into said body unless said locking pins are withdrawn from engagement with said arms.

WM. P. RIDDELL.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 727,342 Fuller May 5, 1903 2,446,312 Usina Aug. 3, 1948 2,515,544 Artley July 18, 1950 2,567,348 Price Sept. 11, 1951 2,576,089 Ehmke Nov. 27, 1951 FOREIGN PATENTS Number Country Date 494,210 Great Britain Oct. 21, 1938 

